Making CapsLock work in Vim
This tip describes how to make Caps Lock work "normally" in Vim without interfering with command mode. It relies on an external program, AutoHotKey, and has been tested on Windows. It could be adapted to Linux using xmodmap or similar utilities. The Problem While most modern programming languages are edited in mixed case, there are occasions, such as writing DISCLAIMER OF LIABILITY blurbs in EULAs or editing legacy FORTRAN or COBOL code, where a correctly working Caps Lock would be a boon. vi (and therefore, Vim) and Caps Lock do not go well together, because letters are commands and case sensitive. Setting CapsLock will make vi(m) behave in very strange ways in command mode. The solution A partial solution of mine was to create, in my vimrc, a couple of Vim commands/functions called Caps and Mixed which set case on input only: command -nargs=0 Caps :call s:Caps() command -nargs=0 Mixed :call s:Mixed() function s:Caps() im a A im b B im c C --snip-- im z Z echo "CAPS ON" hi LineNr term=underline ctermfg=3 guifg=Red3 guibg=#cccccc endfunction function s:Mixed() im a a im b b im c c --snip-- im z z echo "Caps Off" hi LineNr term=underline ctermfg=3 guifg=Red3 guibg=#99dddd endfunction Elsewhere, I mapped F5 and F6 to set up caps or mixed, respectively: map :Caps map :Mixed This is a Vim-only solution requiring no outside help. To remind myself of the current state of capslocking, I change the color of the line number prefix area. Since I always have line numbers on when editing FORTRAN, and since I rarely change my color scheme, this works satisfactorily for me. Other folks may want to set up other indicators, or dispense with them altogether. Over the course of some weeks, I managed to partially train myself to hit F6 when typing literal text or comments, and F5 for "normal" code, which needs to be all upper case. But it doesn't feel right to use these (hard to reach) keys in Vim and Caps Lock elsewhere. I didn't find a solution in Vim, so I use the freeware utility AutoHotKey to help. Here's the script: State = 0 $CapsLock::CapsFunc(State) CapsFunc(ByRef State) { if (not WinActive(ahk_class Vim)) { Send {CapsLock} } else if (State 0) { Send {F6} State = 1 } else { Send {F5} State = 0 } } AutoHotKey provides a script compiler which allowed me to turn this script into a .EXE file of 200K. The special remapping of the CapsLock key happens only within programs having Window Class "vim" (in other words, in gvim), so Caps Lock works as usual in other programs. I've tested this solution under Windows 2000, but it should run in most other versions of Windows too. The AHK documentation mentioned some caveats concerning W95 and WinME. Comments *If it's really necessary to have 26 mappings, you could probably have one map command repeated in a loop (using execute). *Shouldn't the "Mixed" function just unmap the keys rather than mapping them again? What does Vim do with imap a a?). *Is there a Vim-only solution that allows use of CapsLock via the CapsLock key without using an external program, but also keeps CapsLock off in normal mode? *Improve the title (there is no particular fault with CapsLock in Vim). Perhaps rename to "Disable caps lock in normal mode". ----